Had the riots at Dixie M. Hollins High School in St. Petersburg, Florida happened today, I would probably be writing about a body count, who the shooter was, and what weapons he used.
But it was 1971, and what happened at Dixie M. Hollins High School resulted in fighting, injuries, multiple arrests, and at least one stabbing.
I was seven years old in September of 1971, the first school year when court-ordered busing went into effect in an effort to achieve racial integration. One of the school districting lines went down my street. Had I lived on the other side of the street, I would have gone to Northwest Elementary. Instead, I was able to walk four blocks to Westgate Elementary.
I didn't understand the controversy about busing. That first year, I mainly remember the "bus students" listed on the roll in my third grade class. They were Tonetta, Rita, Lolita, and Valarie, they were placed at the end of the roll and called out separately.
But during September and October of 1971, Dixie M. Hollins High School was embroiled in controversy, a controversy that would end up making national news.
In December, 2015, Tampa Bay Times reporter John Romano looked back on those days. He described the students who lived through them as "kids who fought with fists and wounded with words . . . who saw cops on the school's rooftop with rifles and saw adults inciting violence from across the street . . . who saw football games and school days canceled for fear of race riots."
It started a week after the school year began, when Dixie Hollins' principal got on the intercom and announced that the Confederate battle flag, the "Stars and Bars", would no longer be permitted on campus.
For a school whose fight song was "Dixie" and whose athletic teams were called the "Rebels," this spelled trouble.
The next day, angry adults, Confederate battle flags in hand, stood across the street, protesting.
For the next couple of weeks, they drove up and down the street, the Stars and Bars protruding from the backs of their cars, flapping in the breeze, as Black students arrived on campus.
Tension built. Fights broke out. Students were sent home early due to fears of violence.
The week of October 11, 1971, all hell broke loose.
On October 12, 1971, the school had to be closed after what the St. Petersburg Times described as a "fist-swinging, rock-throwing, slogan-shouting melee." Afterwards, the school superintendent was quoted as saying, "God, I'm tired. They didn't have any courses like this in school administration."
The next day, a 16-year-old girl brought a steak knife to school and stabbed a deputy in the chest. Fortunately, the wound was minor.
Eventually, things settled down, though not without simmering unrest under the surface.
In 2020, although the official name of the school remains Dixie M. Hollins High School, the school decided to brand themselves as "Hollins High", and gave themselves a new nickname, the "Royals."
The irony here is that Dixie Martin Hollins, the first superintendent of schools for Pinellas County, supported education for all students, no matter what race, and he often hired people from Black colleges and universities.
But with the first name "Dixie", the nickname "Rebels", and a mascot resembling a Confederate colonel, "we'd still be tied to a past that we needed to break free from," according to principal Bob Florio.
This school year marks 50 years since those days of tension and rioting. I remember little about it except reading bits about it in the paper and seeing bits of it on the news. Two of the people arrested during that October week of violence were the father and sister of a girl in my sister's Girl Scout troop.
That Friday, I went with my mother and sister to drop my sister off at weekend camp. The father was there, and he and my mother had a long discussion. I heard none of it. Instead, as a seven-year-old going on eight, all I wondered were two things: 1. Why was he here and not in jail, since he'd been arrested (he was probably out on bail), and 2. Where were the marks of the handcuffs on his wrists?
Such is the innocence of a little girl.
I'd love to say that we've progressed in 50 years.
But school violence? Confederate flag controversies? Racial tensions?
Little, if anything, has changed.
Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.
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